Meet Viktoria Modesta, the Bionic Pop Star Changing the Way We View Sexy

As her new video, "Prototype," proclaims in its title, Viktoria Modesta is a new kind of pop star altogether. The 26-year-old Latvian singer is sexy, talented, and an amputee: After undergoing 15 surgeries at a young age to repair a leg that had been damaged at birth, Modesta elected to fully remove the appendage in order to improve her life.

Courtesy Viktoria Modesta

Six years later, she's singing about her transformation, the freedom her choice has given her, and the fact that she—with her less than mainstream body type—is the model of the future: "Assemble me, piece by piece/ Strip away the incomplete, the model of the future/ Colliding minds, it's just a start/ Feel the sparks, we're building art/ It's the vertigo of freedom."

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Forget what you knew about disability is the message that appears at the start of the video. And she drives that point home throughout the six-minute clip during which we watch her dance like Katy Perry, sport a light-up limb, and take down her enemies with a move plucked from Basic Instinct. Also in the video: the pop star simulating sex like so many other risqué music videos. And as it would be with any of her peers, the most shocking detail is the number of participants involved in the bedroom romp.

Modesta's amputated leg, which she displays without any inhibition, is hardly a focal point.

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